Paul Stanhope: Lux Aeterna Sydney Chamber Choir & Paul Stanhope

• Anonymous:
• 1 Fiant Luminaria 07:08
• Traditional:
• 2 Agnus Dei / Do Not Stand at My Grave and Weep 07:31
• 3 Lux Aeterna 05:57
• Anonymous:
• 4 Ubi Caritas 04:44
• 5 Lament to Saint Cecilia 06:03
• Paul Stanhope & Steve Hawke:
• 6 Stanhope, Hawke: Jandamarra – Sing for the Country: The Land Is Healed. Ban.garay! 05:13
• Anonymous:
• 7 Exile Lamentations – Three Choruses: 1. Eykhah 06:37
• Paul Stanhope, Jabrā Ibrāhīm Jabrā, Hamid Algar, Mounah Abdallah Khouri:
• 8 Stanhope, Jabrā, Algar, Khouri: Exile Lamentations – Three Choruses: 2. Deserts of Exile 08:33
• Paul Stanhope, Tawfīq Ṣāyigh, Khalid Sulaiman:
• 9 Stanhope, Ṣāyigh, Sulaiman: Exile Lamentations – Three Choruses: 3. Lament 04:12
• Paul Stanhope & Robert Marshall:
• 10 Stanhope, Marshall: Cherubic Hymn 05:30
• Total Runtime 01:01:28

Info for Paul Stanhope: Lux Aeterna

"Lux Aeterna" – ‘eternal light’ – the struggle of light and darkness: an ancient concept, inspiring music-making for centuries.

The new album from Australian composer Paul Stanhope brings this search for light into the present day, setting texts from across cultures and ages: Arabic poetry, Old Testament verses, liturgical chants, and present-day words from Australia and South America. By turns elegiac and urgent, serene and rapturous, Lux Aeterna lives out themes of optimism, humanity and empathy.

Stanhope’s music is recorded here with the choir he has collaborated with over the past decade, Sydney Chamber Choir, resulting in a uniquely satisfying depth of understanding of Stanhope’s musical language and the text which he sets.

Lux Aeterna (Eternal Light) eloquently expresses the theme of light that runs through the programme. While retaining a gentle modernist idiom, its reminiscences of Britten and Duruflé sensitively illuminate the text. Duruflé’s influence is also felt in Ubi Caritas. Lush choral textures and harmonies make the music equally attractive to singers and listeners. The same can be said for Cherubic Hymn, another effective motet. Fiant Luminaria (scored for choir, timpani, percussion, piano and organ) vividly recounts the creation of light from Genesis and shares an interest in creation with The Land is Healed. Ban.garay!, a work based on the indigenous story of Jandamarra.

Exile Lamentations consist of three choruses which “reflect upon the experience of displacement, homelessness and banishment”. Harnessing the power of choral music, this is a thoughtful exploration of an important contemporary issue using Jewish and Palestinian elements. Stanhope’s old choir does him proud here: performances are disciplined yet empathetic. How good to have such an uplifting collection of Australian choral music! (Tony Way, limelightmagazine.com.au)

Sydney Chamber Choir
Paul Stanhope, conductor

Paul Stanhope
is an award-winning Sydney-based composer, former Musical Director of Sydney Chamber Choir and currently a Senior Lecturer in Composition at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, University of Sydney. Previous releases on the ABC Classics label include Songs for the Shadowland – an album of song cycles for combinations of voices and instruments.

Sydney Chamber Choir
Formed in 1975, Sydney Chamber Choir, under founding director Nicholas Routley, quickly established itself among Australia’s finest performers of Renaissance choral music, especially the works of Josquin des Prez. The Choir was also a pioneer in revitalising performances of Baroque masterpieces by Bach and Handel. At the same time, it began a program of commissioning new music from Australian composers – a tradition which flourished under the leadership of the Choir’s second Musical Director, Paul Stanhope, and continues to the present day, with 20 world premieres in the past ten years.

This album contains no booklet.